NC State Women's Tennis Faces Arizona State in NCAA Regional Opener

#35 NC State (15-11) vs. #23 Arizona State (17-5)
Friday, May 13
12 p.m.
Auburn, Ala. – Yarbrough Tennis Center
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RALEIGH – For the first time since the 2013 season the No. 35 NC State women's tennis team (15-11) will make an appearance at the 2016 NCAA Regional when it faces No. 23 Arizona State (17-5) Friday. The first-round matchup is set for noon in Auburn, Ala.

Friday marks coach Simon Earnshaw's first outing at the national competition since assuming lead of the Wolfpack in 2014. In his second season as head coach, Earnshaw made program history, as the team established a record six victories over conference opponents during the regular season. The Pack held a national ranking throughout the majority of the 2016 season, peaking at No. 31 and currently listed No. 35 among the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) team poll.

READ: Pack Rising

Along with Earnshaw, seven of the Wolfpack's eight players will make their first NCAA appearance for Pack Friday. At the top of the lineup for the Red and White, No. 45 Martina Frantova heads into tournament action holding a 14-10 dual record at the No. 1 singles position, which includes eight wins over nationally-ranked opponents. Her impressive first season at NC State garnered the Slovakia native a NCAA singles selection, making her the fourth player in program history to receive a bid. In the past month Frantova has claimed a slew of accolades including ACC Co-Player of the Week, an All-ACC Second Team honor and most recently was voted ITA Carolina Region Player to Watch.

READ: Frantova Claims ITA Carolina Region Player to Watch Award

SCOUTING ARIZONA STATE:
The No. 23 Sun Devils begins its 29th-straight NCAA Tournament appearance with Friday's dual with the Pack. The team boasts a competitive roster that includes No. 35 Desirae Krawczyk and current Pac-12 Doubles Champions No. 15 Alexandra Osborne and Ebony Panoho along with its head coach, Sheila McInerney, recently named Pac-12 Coach of the Year.

Arizona State showcases strength in its doubles performance, capturing the doubles decision in 19 of its 22 matches, presenting the Pack's improved doubles play with a challenge. The two teams shared three mutual opponents during the 2016 season, resulting in similar finishes, both with wins over Notre Dame and Long Beach State and a loss at Pepperdine.

IN DEPTH: Arizona State season statistics

SIMON SAYS:
"We are coming off almost three weeks of excellent practice. I'm confident that we've made a lot of progress since our last match and the girls are in great physical shape right now. I'm a little cautious because of the break since the ACC Tournament, you never know how that's going to go and in my career usually there has only been about a 10-day lag before playing NCAAs. Hopefully we are even hungrier to play and compete again because of the break.

"The girls are excited for sure, we've already hit almost every team goal for the year but there's still a couple out there at the top of our list to work towards. We expected to be in this position, despite the team being relatively young, and I'm very confident that the longer this season goes the better our team will be. As a team we're in a really good spot right now, everybody is in very high spirits but we're still not getting ahead of ourselves. We've got a few more days to concentrate on our preparation before the match on Friday.

"Our first round opponent, Arizona State, has had an excellent season, maybe one of its best ever in Pac-12 play. I haven't checked this, but on paper it could be one of the toughest first-round matchups based on the ITA rankings. That goes both ways for both teams and is what I would expect coming into the tournament. Coach McInerney has done a great job with her team for many years and I'm sure will have it ready to go. We've had a few common opponents with some similar results but it's hard to draw too many conclusions from that based on matchups. I'm sure that both teams aim to play its best match of the season thus far and it's going to be a real battle as it should always be in postseason play. Go Pack!" – Simon Earnshaw, head coach

The winner of the NC State-Arizona State dual will face the winner of the matchup between No. 11 Auburn and SWAC Champion Alcorn State Saturday at 1 p.m. in the second round of NCAA Regional play.

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NC State Women's Tennis Faces Arizona State in NCAA Regional Opener

Players Mentioned

Martina Frantova

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